Death Pearls
by penguinfighter-d-chan
Summary: Part IV of my series: A man dies of what seems to be suspicious circumstances and a girl is kidnapped, both coinciding with the grand opening of a new wing in the local museum, courtesy of Marla Ruez.
1. Thanatos

A/N: Hi! Back again! And just in time for the new season! This would be Part IV of my series and it picks up between Season 7 (gotta catch up), but arc wise, 4 months after _Dog Soup_. Well, then let's get this show on the road! I'm saying this now, I apologize for sporadic updates! Reviews are welcome!

DISCLAIMER: H, his team (C) CBS, Daikonran and Sexie (c) my sister, the rest (c) me

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I, Thanatos

Mark Wrangler, a successful divorce attorney, started his day with his usual morning routine; morning hygiene and a cup of coffee. Last night, he and Rachael Parker, the host of the firm's party, had a one-night stand that was beyond he had ever experienced in his life. Said woman somehow managed to disappear from their bedside for a moment while Wrangler dressed himself for the day. Both had decided to exit his Coral Gables house in different times, to throw off any suspicions.

"You know this was just a one-time deal, right?" Mark commented off-handedly as Rachael stepped out the shower, wearing only a bath robe. "And you know that if you want to keep your job, you won't say anything to our coworkers," the fellow lawyer added as she put on her wedding ring and the rest of her clothes while he exited the building and into the garage.

Suddenly, Rachael felt the light sting of sunburn and recoiled back inside. When she took a look at her hand, it was burned to the second degree, way too fast to be just the sun. "What the?!" In that instant, she heard a desperate scream of anguish as Mark exploded in flames. Rachael watched in horror as the man fell to the floor and dialed 911 on her cell phone, all the while staying inside…

0000

Lt. Horatio Caine loomed over the charred body, perplexed at the sheer severity of the burns. "Looks like this man was burned alive," he commented while removing his sunglasses. "More like broiled; by the look of the foam around his mouth, I'd say his insides are probably well-done too." Secondet "Sexie" Lainhart added as he stood up from the corpse. After his mentor, Alexx Woods, left abruptly, Sexie was assigned a full-time shift alongside Dr. Tara Price. "Any witnesses?" Caine further inquired. "Other than the woman inside, no one. Frank's with her right now," the angel informed as he commanded the ME personnel to take the body away.

Ryan Wolfe arrived none the wiser and spotted the corpse as he met up with fellow CSI Eric Delko. "Barbecue's revenge?" "If it were that easy, we wouldn't have been called. Kino called in; he wants first dibs on the body." Eric replied with a sarcastic chuckle as they both prepared to process the car. "Door handle's scorched; that's quite a feat considering that the plastic polymer used for car making can stand temperatures higher than 300 degrees Fahrenheit." Wolfe noted while applying fingerprint powder. "Meaning that whatever fire caused the victim's death had to be 500 degrees or more." Delko added, even more confused; nothing available at the scene could make such a fire.

0000

"Ma'am, my name's Horatio Caine and I'm with the Miami-Dade Police Department. Did you see anything that seemed out of sorts with Mr. Wrangler?" Horatio inquired as he sat down besides the shell-shocked woman. Rachael Parker had a clear distress about her, clutching her bandaged hand close to her heart as she shook her head as a response. "We came home from a party at our law firm, spent the night together and suddenly, he bursts into flames for no good reason!"

Sergeant Frank Tripp picked up the wounded hand and asked, "What happened to you?" The question made Mrs. Parker flinch but allowed the two officers to remove the bandages. The wound had degraded into an infectious burn, covered in pus and blood. "That looks serious, you need to see a doctor right away-" Tripp's advice was cut short when Rachael whipped her hand back to her. "I am not stepping outside…" "Mrs. Parker, we can guarantee police protection, if you like." Horatio offered but to no avail. "I'm not coming out while the Sun's still up." Rachael hissed, causing concern between the two. "Please leave; I swear I won't go anywhere." She continued while changing her cloths.

As Mrs. Parker disappeared from sight, Frank said, "Something ain't right in this picture; the woman seems like she's terrified of the sun than anything." Horatio nodded in agreement as he bagged the bandages. "I'll send these to Kino over at Dade Memorial to see if I can isolate whatever's causing her allergy. Frank, I need everything you can find on that party."

00000

Meanwhile, Calleigh Duquesne arrived at the Peterson home just as her partner raised the yellow police tape. "We finally get to work together, huh Speedle?" "What can I say, I'm unavailable." The ragdoll smirked as he let her in. The home had been ransacked, belying the kidnapping that had taken place. "Lucinda Peterson, age 18, cheerleader at the local high school. Mother called it in thirty minutes ago," Tim explained to the ballistics expert while she took some base photographs of the home.

Annie Peterson, the victim's mother, was inconsolable by the time the CSIs entered her home. "She was a good girl; never missed a practice, never did anything…she was going places," she wept soundly as Rudolph, the victim's brother, tried to comfort her. Both Calleigh and Speedle could see the woman's suffering and adjusted their questioning methods to minimize any discomfort.

"Ma'am, did Lucinda have any enemies in school? Anybody who didn't sit right?" Duquesne inquired while Tim went up to the girl's room. "Not that I know of; she was very well-liked among her friends," Mrs. Peterson responded while wiping a tear from her mascara-ridden eyes. Upstairs, Speedle gave the room a quick sweep for anything that seemed out of place; any presence that didn't belong. The bed was hastily made with clothes hangers laid strewn across; the shoe rack was a bit ransacked but nothing too much.

_Looks to me like she just went off on holiday,_ Speed thought as he picked up a small pink box decorated with hearts. A condom wrapper fell out of the tiny space, further corroborating his theory. _But, just to make sure, black light_, he concluded while setting up the device and closing the window shields. As soon as he fired the black light on, the bed lit up like a firefly; splotches invisible to the naked eye suddenly jumped at the CSI. "Whoa, didn't see that one coming," Tim commented rather ironically, taking out swabs to collect samples from the covers to the floor under the bed. He then peeked down the stairs and called out, "You might want to see this, Cal."

By the time Calleigh came up to Lucinda's room, Speedle was already testing his samples. "What did you find?" she asked, kneeling beside her living-impaired coworker. The cotton swab turned to bright pink: there was blood present in the room. "I think we're dealing with an aggressive kidnapper," Tim replied heavily; this wasn't a turn for the best.


	2. Pathos

A/N: New chapter post, sorry it's a bit short...hope you guys enjoy! Reviews are welcome! CSIs (C) CBS, Dai and Sexie (C) my sister

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II, Pathos_

The childish pink and lavender hues that decorated the room belied whatever happened in Lucinda Patterson's room; by the way the room lit up with the black light, she wasn't as innocent as the pictures on her mantle. "I'll start collecting samples, maybe the kidnapper left something behind," Speedle stated while Calleigh returned to Mrs. Patterson's side downstairs. After securing swabs of every glowing spot in the bed and floor area, the ragdoll fished around the furniture, looking for any personal items that could give up a hint on the girl's location. He finally found a small day-planner on top of her bedside table, the current week bookmarked by a pink paperclip.

A quick beep sound distracted Tim from his duty, shifting his attention towards an idle MacBook with a small but nonetheless significant splatter of blood on the screen and keyboard. _She left her laptop on, meaning she wasn't expecting her captor; the guy probably used brute force to subdue her,_ he surmised as he photographed and bagged the computer as evidence. The next item of interest that Speedle found was the overflowing wastebasket in an otherwise impeccable room. "She hasn't slept here in a while," he thought out loud as he took a picture of the object and sealed it for further investigation. _Wonder how Cal's doing?_ He asked himself as he put away some photo envelopes he found underneath the bed.

Downstairs, Calleigh was already trying to piece together a mental image of the kidnapped victim by inquiring her mother about her daily routine. "She wakes up at somewhere between 6:30 and 7 in the morning, drives to school and after that, she has cheer practice," Anne replied while Rudolph quietly scoffed, just beyond his mother's line of sight but the ballistic expert's. _The brother knows something the mother doesn't; not that big of a stretch,_ Calleigh intently observed.

"Are you sure that's her whole routine?" "Why yes; she even called me whenever she ran late! Are you insinuating she was doing something else?" the dignified tone was a tattletale sign to the CSI that there was more to Lucinda than what she seemed. _She could've easily cut class but then we'd have to verify her friends…_she thought. "We can only hope we can find her before something terrible happens," Calleigh concluded the interview and focused her attention to Mrs. Peterson's son.

00000

After bagging the bandages and taking some cell phone snapshots of the surviving victim, Horatio headed to the deceased's back yard, making sure he wasn't followed. _At this hour, morning traffic's too heavy to get to the hospital to get the results on time; I have to take a short cut,_ the lieutenant reasoned while giving the area one last look-around. When it became certain he was alone, he took a deep breath.

Two massive white wings burst from the slits on Horatio's back, stretching them out for a second before he took off. Once he was in a considerable distance from the ground, the lieutenant located Dade Memorial Hospital and flew off in that direction. Contrary to the hour and a half the commute would've taken on car, Caine landed on the building's roof in 30 minutes to a grinning Dr. Kino.

"Getting cocky, are we?" "Just as long as the work is done; Secondet is working with the fatality but right now, I need you to analyze this," Horatio replied while presenting Rachel's sample and before explaining her symptoms. "Severe polymorphous light eruptions aren't very common in humans but what you've described is possibly one-in-a-million freak," the general practice doctor analyzed, "and you say someone _died_ with these symptoms?" "That's what Sexie told me; could this be transmittable?" Caine inquired for the sake of protecting his team from exposure. "No, PLE is a somatic-recessive genetic reaction to Photophobia; you're either born allergic to the Sun or not."

"If there are viable tissues, I'll see what I can find out for you," Daikonran certified just before Horatio took to the skies. "Be careful; I heard there were weather balloons up today!" The doctor then sprinted to the hospital's clinical laboratory over at the fifth floor. _The bandages are laden with blood and pus so I have a pretty good chance to isolate pathogens_, Kino thought as he cut the sample into small squares and placing two into test tubes. He ran some control tests and found that the unknown patient wasn't, by basic medical standards, sick.

"Other than an abnormal leukocyte count due to infection, this patient has no unusual characteristics," Kino wrote on his preliminary report as he set up the next round; this was looking to be a most interesting case. He then sent a text message to both Caine and Tripp before placing a call to his attending nurse on the hospital line. "Holly, I need you to get me the files on Mark Wrangler and Rachel Parker as soon as possible," he requested with a sweet tone. Holly Massanet RN wasn't one to fall for her boss's antics and asked with an ironic tone of voice, "And what if I run into a lack of cooperation?" "Show them the badge."

00000

Eric was just about to finish up with the car and release it into the impound officials when a scrap of paper caught his eye. "Found something; this paper has a cotton feel to it, fancy lettering printed in what looks like India ink," he announced as he photographed the item and lifted it over his head in order for Wolfe to see it. "Frank did mention that the victims attended a party last night; maybe this could lead us to anyone else that might be suffering the same as them," Ryan stated as he signaled his coworkers to take the vehicle away.


	3. Hot and Cold

A/N: New season, new chapters! One thing though...please don't pressure me into updating every week...I get enough pressure from myself to finish up with stories; just sit back and enjoy them! Reviews are welcome! CSIs (C) CBS, Dai and Sexie (C) my twin lita_ann_kino

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III, Hot and Cold_

Secondet was nearly done in his autopsy report went Horatio arrived at his post. "Hard to believe that only four months ago, you were that sick," the practicing ME commented, making the lieutenant smirk. "Good times; how's Mr. Wrangler?" The younger angel chuckled as he lifted the remaining skin tissue from the corpse, "My first impressions were right; his organs were destroyed when I opened him. Cause of death was internal immolation from the inside out; the man was burning at least 503 degrees at the highest temperature possible," Sexie elaborated while pointing out a severely burnt liver and stomach.

"What a horrible way to die," Caine started off before noting a glint in Lainheart's eyes, "you have something else for me, don't you?" "Actually yes, his blood," Sexie stated before presenting his boss a small capped vial with what could best be described as concentrated cranberry jelly. "That's all I could save for you," the ME concluded but Horatio was a bit confused. "Isn't blood the first thing to go during something like this?" he inquired, getting a nod as a response.

"Sort of; your assumption's based on the fact that, like the rest of the human body, blood is made up of mostly water," Sexie then poured some water, mixed in some coloring on a beaker and asked Horatio to boil it. "Apply enough heat to H20 and you get evaporation, right? But in this case, the blood congealed and clotted, as if the burn was an allergy. I'll run Toxicology on them but the probability that Mr. Wrangler and Mrs Parker have the same condition is almost 15 million to one. "

"This would be the second time today I've heard 'burn' and 'allergy' in the same sentence; I'm seeing a pattern," Caine concluded before suddenly getting slapped in the arm. "I know, my husband called me…you shouldn't be so reckless!" Horatio couldn't help but laugh when he replied as he left the office, "The traffic was killer, can you blame me?"

But as soon as he left, the lieutenant found another surprise, this one slightly bittersweet; Yelina Salas was just about to enter the crime lab. "Yelina? It's been a while," Caine greeted his sister-in-law in a calm manner all the while scanning for any signs of Raymond. "It has; how are you feeling?" she replied as she wrapped her arms around him. The question seemed painfully ironic considering that four months ago, Ray almost beat Horatio to death in the same building. _Ray hasn't told her yet…good_, the lieutenant thought as if to comfort himself; Yelina didn't need to know the atrocities her husband had committed. "I'm good; how's Ray Jr.?"

"Learning to fly with his father; they're reconnecting like old times," the private detective said, her voice wistful at her husband's memory. "Horatio, I have to ask; why didn't you come to last week's barbecue? Ray Jr. wanted to show you-" Salas' question was cut short by Horatio's stoic response: "Raymond and I have issues to work with." A heavy atmosphere formed between the two as Caine bid Yelina farewell and met up with Speedle. _My promise stands true, Ray; you hurt Yelina or Ray Jr., I'll kill you on the spot_, he reminded himself, his blue eyes darkening with rage.

"You look pissed; what happened?" Tim asked his master as he unloaded his evidence from the Peterson case. "Family problems…how's your case going?" "Evidence wise," Speed shook his hand to reply, "She's either dead or in serious problems; Calleigh's bringing in the brother for questioning as we speak. Yours?" "Whatever you hear, it's probably right. Problem is that we have to wait until both toxicology on the dead victim _and_ the blood tests on the witness come back to confirm they had the same disease," Horatio answered as he put on his sunglasses and headed to the impound lot.

00000

Rudolph squirmed in the interrogation seat as Calleigh and the Child Services lawyer entered the room. "This is Christine Hasselback; she'll be present during our conversation, ok?" Duquesne assured with a kind smile. "Yeah sure; why am I here again?" the young man spat back nervously. "It's not serious but you seemed to have something to say back home so I set up this room so we can talk in private," the CSI explained as best as she could before Hasselback could find any fault in her actions.

The Peterson boy straightened up at the idea and quickly organized his thoughts. "Mom doesn't know it but my sister's not the saint she tells everyone she is. I've seen her do everything under the sun," Rudolph said upfront, as if he were hiding this for a long time. "For example?" "Drinking, partying, one time I caught her sneaking off for some guy up to her friend's parents' room," _The evidence Speedle's shown me concurs with what he's saying, but,_ Calleigh analyzed before asking the young man, "If you knew what was going on, why didn't you tell anyone about it?"

To this question, Rudolph hung his shoulders with slight embarrassment. "Lucinda's a cheerleader; she told me that I could get into her parties if I kept quiet. I mean, do I look like a jock or something to you?" To be quite frank, Rudolph Peterson appeared quite ordinary compared to his sister and his mother, making for a very low self-esteem. "No, but you do look like an honest young man," Calleigh pledged before dismissing him.

"You might want to keep this," Rudolph then dropped off a folded picture onto the tabletop as he left the room. The photo showed Lucinda with a couple of classmates at a bonfire party. One the young men was especially comfortable with the kidnapped girl; his hand was caught sneaking a feel up her shirt. "Maybe one of those guys could tell us more about Lucinda's whereabouts," Calleigh concluded while dialing Speed's number.

The call came in just as Horatio had left the vicinity so Tim could answer without problem. "Speed," "Tim, I need you to check on some details on Lucinda's laptop; she might just give us the last person to see her," Duquesne's voice was firm but had a bit of spark to them; she had a lead.

00000

As soon as Mr. Wrangler's car arrived to the impound lot, Ryan collected what tissue had singed into the vehicle's body. _The body must've been insanely hot to do the damage it did…_the CSI mused when Horatio entered the area. "Ryan, what do we have?" "Not much; how hot did Sexie register the victim's temperature was?" Wolfe inquired as he handed his boss a flashlight and invited him to the search. "Average was in the low 400s; Mr. Wrangler went quick but not painless," Caine replied, flashing his searchlight over the other side of the car frame.

"Figures but look at how this door handed melted; the heat was localized to that one spot," Ryan analyzed out loud. "You mean to tell me that the victim was the _source_ of the heat? Suddenly, spontaneous human combustion just became a viable cause of death," Horatio commented, earning an involuntary scoff from Ryan. Once he noticed his momentary lack of respect, the junior CSI quickly apologized before saying, "It's just that SHC is an urban myth with no definite proof."

Horatio gave his teammate a kind but scolding smirk when he said, "This last year has not been kind to skeptics, now has it, Mr. Wolfe?" As one of Caine's chevaliers, Ryan was all too aware of the developments. "I'll keep you posted as soon as I'm done checking the car," Wolfe assured while writing down every detail he could find in the car.


End file.
